Food prices, ethanol policy could be campaign issues
Posted by Truth About Trade & Technology
Monday, 05 May 2008
Des Moines Register
Washington, D.C. - It hardly seems possible the cost of food could be a campaign issue in a nation that still has one of the most affordable food supplies in the world.
But it could happen this year. The question farmers and ethanol producers have to be concerned about is whether the nation's ethanol policy becomes part of the debate.
A candidate who renounces corn ethanol "would gain traction among U.S. voters and foreign leaders for doing the right thing," author Robert Bryce wrote in the Chicago Tribune. Bryce is managing editor of the Energy Tribune and author of "Gusher of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions of Energy Independence."
Bruce Babcock, director of Iowa State University's Center for Agricultural and Rural Development, said egg prices are higher because of the soaring cost of corn to feed poultry, and meat prices as farms cut back on production to cope with feed prices. "If ethanol gets blamed for everything, I could see a backlash. Whether it's correct or not."
Larry Sabato, a political analyst at the University of Virginia, said the public's view of the economy is one of the two or three most important variables in a presidential campaign. This year, he said, when voters are asked about the economy, the rising cost of food is at the top of their minds.
But that said, that doesn't mean that voters will blame the government's biofuel policy for the prices they're paying at the supermarket, Sabato said.
"Most voters for better or ill don't get into the weeds," he said. "They just look at the field."
That would be good news to Democrats in this year's presidential race, and especially to Barack Obama, who has been championing corn ethanol since he arrived in the Senate from Illinois in 2004. He and New York Sen. Hillary Clinton both voted for last year's energy bill, which increased the nation's biofuels mandate, boosting use of corn-based ethanol.
The Republican nominee-in-waiting, Arizona Sen. John McCain, skipped the vote on the energy bill but opposes both mandates and subsidies for ethanol usage.
Democrats are clearly sensitive to the issue. After days of headlines in the nation's major newspapers about food prices worldwide, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office started circulating the Renewable Fuels Association's talking points on why ethanol was not at fault.
McCain may not even benefit from a public backlash against ethanol even if it does get that far. During the run-up to the Iowa presidential caucuses, he talked positively about ethanol as a fuel, and that may have created the impression that he flip-flopped on federal policy.
Both he and Clinton, who once was a critic of ethanol herself, "have become ethanol boosters" since launching their presidential campaigns, Bryce said.
Ethanol producers are worried about their public perceptions, even if they don't become a campaign issue. Public image is critical to an industry whose very existence is dependent on government support. The Environmental Protection Agency is weighing a request by Texas to roll back the new biofuels mandate.
"I don't think we're necessarily losing out in the public's mind yet, but I don't know how many months and years (of criticism) we can take," said Monte Shaw, executive director of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association.
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